he last of Rachel Stone's luck ran out in front of the Pride of Carolina Drive-In. There on a mountainous two-lane blacktop road shimmering from the heat of the June afternoon, her old Chevy Impala gave its final death rattle.

She barely managed to pull off onto the shoulder before a plume of dark smoke rose from beneath the hood and obscured her vision. The car died right beneath the drive-in theater's yellow and purple starburst-shaped sign.

This final disaster was overwhelming. She folded her hands on top of the steering wheel, dropped her forehead on them, and gave in to the despair that had been nipping at her heels for three long years. Here on this two-lane highway, just outside the ironically named Salvation, North Carolina, she'd finally reached the end of her personal road to hell.

"Mommy?"

She wiped her eyes on her knuckles and lifted her head. "I thought you were asleep, honey."

"I was. But that bad sound waked me up."

She turned and gazed at her son, who had recently celebrated his fifth birthday, sitting in the backseat amidst the shabby bundles and boxes that held all their worldly possessions. The Impala's trunk was empty simply because it had been smashed in years ago and couldn't be opened.

Edward's cheek was creased where he'd been lying on it, and his light-brown hair stuck up at his cowlick. He was small for his age, too thin, and still pale from the recent bout with pneumonia that had threatened his life. She loved him with all her heart.

Now his solemn brown eyes regarded her over the head of Horse, the bedraggled stuffed lop-eared rabbit that had been his constant companion since he was a toddler. "Did something bad happen again?"

Her lips felt stiff as she formed them into a reassuring smile. "A little car trouble, that's all."

"Are we gonna die?"

"No, honey. Of course we're not. Now why don't you get out and stretch your legs a little bit while I take a look. Just stay back from the road."

He clamped Horse's threadbare rabbit's ear between his teeth and climbed over a laundry basket filled with secondhand play clothes and a few old towels. His legs were thin, pale little sticks hinged with bony knees, and he had a small port-wine mark at the nape of his neck. It was one of her favorite places to kiss. She leaned over the back of the seat and helped him with the door, which functioned only a little better than the broken trunk.

Are we gonna die? How many times had he asked her that question recently? Never an outgoing child, these last few months had made him even more fearful, guarded, and old beyond his years.

She suspected he was hungry. The last filling meal she'd given him had been four hours ago: a withered orange, a carton of milk, and a jelly sandwich eaten at a roadside picnic table near Winston-Salem. What kind of mother couldn't feed her child better than that?

One who only had nine dollars and change left in her wallet. Nine dollars and change separating her from the end of the world.

She caught a glimpse of herself in the rearview mirror and remembered that she'd once been considered pretty. Now lines of strain bracketed her mouth and fanned out from the corners of green eyes that seemed to eat up her face. The freckled skin over her cheekbones was so pale and tightly stretched it looked as if it might split. She had no money for beauty salons, and her wild mane of curly auburn hair swirled like a tattered autumn leaf around her too-thin face. The only cosmetic she had left was the stub of a mocha-colored lipstick that lay at the bottom of her purse, and she hadn't bothered to use it in weeks. What was the point? Though she was twenty-seven, she felt like an old woman.

She glanced down at the sleeveless blue chambray dress that hung from her bony shoulders. The dress was faded, much too big, and she'd had to replace one of its six red buttons with a brown button after the original cracked. She'd told Edward she was making a fashion statement.

The Impala's door squealed in protest as she opened it, and when she stepped out onto the blacktop, she felt the heat radiating through the paper-thin soles of her worn white sandals. One of the straps had broken. She'd done her best to sew it back together, but the result had left a rough place that had rubbed the side of her big toe raw. It was a small pain compared with the larger one of trying to survive.

A pickup truck whizzed by but didn't stop. Her wild hair slapped her cheeks, and she used her forearm to push away the tangled strands, as well as to shield her eyes from the billow of dust the track kicked up. She glanced over at Edward. He was standing beside the bushes with Horse tucked under his armpit and his head bent at a sharp angle so he could stare up at the yellow and purple star-burst-shaped sign that soared above him like an exploding galaxy. Outlined in lightbulbs, it contained the words Pride of Carolina.

With a feeling of inevitability, she lifted the hood, then stepped back from the gust of black smoke billowing from the engine. The mechanic in Norfolk had warned her the engine was going to blow, and she knew this wasn't anything that could be fixed with duct tape or a junkyard part.

Her head dipped. Not only had she lost a car, but she had also lost her home, since she and Edward had been living in the Impala for nearly a week. She'd told Edward they were lucky to be able to take their house with them, just like turtles.

She sat back on her heels and tried to accept the newest in a long string of calamities that had brought her back to this town she'd sworn she'd never return to.

"Get out of there, kid."

The threatening sound of a deep male voice cut through her misery. She stood so fast it made her woozy, and she had to grab the hood of the car for support. When her head cleared, she saw her son standing frozen before a menacing-looking stranger in jeans, an old blue work shirt, and mirrored sunglasses.

Her sandals slipped in the gravel as she flew around the rear of the car. Edward was too frightened to move. The man reached for him.

Once she'd been sweet-tongued and gentle, a dreamy country girl with a poet's soul, but life had toughened her, and her temper flared. "Don't you touch him, you son of a bitch!"

His arm dropped slowly to his side. "This your kid?"

"Yes. And get away from him."

"He was peein' in my bushes." The man's rough, flat voice held a distinct Carolina drawl, but not the smallest trace of emotion. "Get him out of here."

She noticed for the first time that Edward's jeans were unfastened, making her already vulnerable little boy look even more defenseless. He stood frozen in fear, the rabbit tucked under his arm, as he stared up at the man who towered over him.

The stranger was tall and lean, with straight dark hair and a bitter mouth. His face was long and narrow—handsome, she supposed, but too cruelly formed with its sharp cheekbones and hard planes to appeal to her. She felt a momentary gratitude for his mirrored sunglasses. Something told her she didn't want to look into his eyes.

She grabbed Edward and hugged him to her body. Painful experience had taught her not to let anyone push her around, and she sneered at him. "Are those your personal peeing bushes? Is that the problem? You wanted to use them yourself?"

His lips barely moved. "This is my property. Get off it."

"I'd love to, but my car has other ideas."

The drive-in's owner glanced without interest at the corpse of her Impala. "There's a phone in the ticket booth, and the number for Dealy's Garage. While you're waiting for a tow, stay off my land."

He turned on his heel and walked away. Only when he had disappeared behind the trees that grew around the base of the giant movie screen did she let go of her child.

"It's all right, sweetie. Don't pay any attention to him. You didn't do anything wrong."

Edward's face was pale; his bottom lip trembled. "The m-man scared me."

She combed her fingers through his light-brown hair, smoothed down a cowlick, brushed his bangs off his forehead. "I know he did, but he's just an old butthead, and I was here to protect you."

"You told me not to say butthead."

"These are extenuating circumstances."

"What are tenuating circustands?"

"It means he really is a butthead."

"Oh."

She glanced toward the small wooden ticket booth that held the phone. The booth had been freshly painted in mustard and purple, the same garish colors as the sign, but she made no move toward it. She didn't have the money for either a tow or repairs, and her credit cards had been revoked long ago. Unwilling to subject Edward to another confrontation with the drive-in's unpleasant owner, she drew him toward the road. "My legs are stiff from being in the car so long, and I could use a little walk. How about you?"

"Okay."

He dragged his sneakers in the dirt, and she knew he was still frightened. Her resentment against Butthead grew. What kind of jerk acted like that in front of a child?

She reached through the open window of the car and withdrew a blue plastic water jug, along with the last of the withered oranges she'd found on a produce mark-down table. As she directed her child across the highway toward a small grove of trees, she once again cursed herself for not giving in to Clyde Rorsch, who'd been her boss until six days go. Instead, she'd struck him in the side of the head to keep him from raping her, then she'd grabbed Edward and fled Richmond forever.

Now she wished she'd given in. If she'd agreed to have sex with him, she and Edward would be living in a rent-free room in Rorsch's motel where she'd been working as a maid. Why hadn't she shut her eyes and let him do what he wanted? What was the point of being fastidious when her child was hungry and homeless?

She'd made it as far as Norfolk where she'd used up too much of her small reserve of cash to have the Impala's water pump fixed. She knew other women in her position would have applied for public aid, but welfare wasn't an option for her. She'd been forced to apply two years ago, when she and Edward were living in Baltimore. At the time, a social worker had stunned Rachel by questioning her ability to care for Edward. The woman had mentioned the possibility of putting him in foster care until Rachel could get on her feet. Her words might have been well-intentioned, but they had terrified Rachel. Until that moment, she had never considered that someone might try to take Edward away from her. She'd fled Baltimore that same day and vowed never again to approach a government office for help.

Since then she'd been supporting the two of them by working several minimum-wage jobs at a time, earning just enough to keep a roof over their heads, but not enough to be able to set anything aside so she could go back to school and improve her job skills. The battle for decent child care devoured her meager paychecks and made her sick with worry—one of the sitters kept Edward propped in front of a television all day, another disappeared and left him with a boyfriend. Then Edward had gotten sick with pneumonia.

By the time he was released from the hospital, she'd been fired from her fast-food job for absenteeism. Edward's expenses had eaten up everything she had, including her pitifully small savings, and left her with a staggering bill she had no way of paying. She also had a sick child who needed to be carefully watched while he recuperated and an eviction notice for nonpayment of rent on her shabby apartment.

She'd begged Clyde Rorsch to let her have one of the smaller motel rooms rent-free, promising to double her hours in exchange. But he'd wanted something more—sex on demand. When she'd refused, he'd gotten mean, and she'd struck him in the head with the office telephone.

She remembered the blood trickling down the side of his face and the venom in his eyes as he'd vowed to have her arrested for assault. "Let's see how you take care of that precious kid of yours when you're in jail!"

If only she'd stopped resisting and simply let him do what he wanted. What had been unthinkable only a week before didn't seem so inconceivable now. She was tough. She could have survived it. Since the beginning of time, desperate women had used sex for barter, and it was hard to believe she might once have condemned them for it.

She settled Edward next to her beneath a buckeye tree, unscrewed the lid of the water bottle, and handed it to him. As she peeled the orange, she could no longer ignore the compulsion to lift her eyes toward the mountains.

Sun shimmered on a wall of glass, testifying that the Temple of Salvation still stood, although she'd heard it had been taken over by a corrugated-box factory. Five years ago it had been the headquarters and broadcasting studio for G. Dwayne Snopes, one of the wealthiest and most famous televangelists in the country. Rachel pushed away the unpleasant memories and began handing Edward the orange segments. He savored each one as if it were a piece of candy instead of a tough, dried-out segment of fruit that belonged in the garbage.

As he polished off the last one, her gaze moved idly to the drive-in's marquee.

GRAND REOPENING SOON

HELP WANTED NOW

She grew instantly alert. Why hadn't she noticed that earlier? A job! Maybe her luck was finally going to turn.

She refused to think about the drive-in's surly owner. Selectivity was a luxury she hadn't been able to afford in years. With her eyes still fixed on the sign, she patted Edward's knee. It was warm from the sun.

"Sweetheart, I need to go talk to that man again."

"Don't want you to."

She gazed down into his small, worried face. "He's nothing but a big bully. Don't be afraid. I can beat him up with one hand tied behind my back."

"Stay here."

"I can't, pug. I need a job."

He didn't argue further, and she considered what to do with him while she sought out Butthead. Edward wasn't the kind of child who roamed, and she momentarily contemplated leaving him in the car, but it was parked too close to the road. She would have to take him with her.

Giving him a reassuring smile, she tugged him to his feet. As she led him back across the highway, she didn't bother sending up a prayer for divine intervention. Rachel no longer prayed. Her store of faith had been eaten up long ago by G. Dwayne Snopes, and now, not even a mustard seed remained.

The patched strap of her sandal dug into her big toe as she led Edward down the rutted lane past the ticket booth. The drive-in must have been built in these mountains decades earlier and, most likely, abandoned for another decade. Now the freshly painted ticket booth and new chain-link fence that enclosed the property testified to its renovation, but it looked as if there was still a lot of work to be done.

The projection screen had been repaired, but the lot, with its concentric rows of empty metal speaker polls, was overgrown with weeds. In the middle, she spotted a two-story concrete block building, the drive-in's original snack bar and projection booth. Its exterior had once been white, but was now streaked with dirt and mildew. The wide-open doors on the side emitted a blare of acid rock.

She spotted a shabby play area under the screen. It held an empty sandbox, along with half a dozen fiberglass dolphins mounted on heavy springs. She guessed the dolphins had originally been bright blue, but the passing years had faded their color to powder. A rusty jungle gym, the frame of a swing set, a broken merry-go-round, and a concrete turtle completed the pathetic cluster of equipment.

"Go play on that turtle while I talk to the man, Edward. I won't be long."

His eyes silently pleaded with her not to leave him alone. She smiled and gestured toward the playground.

Other children might have thrown a temper tantrum when they realized they weren't going to get their way, but the normal feistiness of childhood had been leeched out of her son. He worried his bottom lip, ducked his head, and tore her insides into a million tiny pieces so that she couldn't let him go.

"Never mind. You can come with me and sit by the door."

His small fingers clutched hers as she drew him toward the concrete building. She could feel the dust invading her lungs. The sun pounded down on her head while the music wailed like a death scream.

She dropped Edward's hand at the door and leaned down so he could hear her over the poisonous guitars and feral drums. "Stay here, punkin."

He clutched at her skirt. With a smile of reassurance, she gently disentangled his fingers and stepped into the concrete building.

The snack bar's counter area and appliances were new, although the dirty concrete-block walls still held a decade-old assortment of ragged flyers and posters. A pair of mirrored sunglasses lay on one section of the new white countertop next to an unopened bag of potato chips, a sandwich wrapped in plastic, and a radio that blasted out its violent music like lethal gas being pumped into an execution chamber.

The drive-in's owner stood on a ladder mounting a fluorescent light fixture to the ceiling. He had his back to her, which gave her a moment to observe this latest mountain standing in the path of her survival.

She saw a pair of paint-splattered brown work boots and frayed jeans that revealed long, powerful legs. His hips were lean, and the muscles of his back bunched under his shirt as he braced the base of the light fixture with one hand and twisted a screwdriver with the other. The rolled cuffs of his shirt revealed deeply tanned forearms, strong wrists, and broad hands with surprisingly elegant fingers. His dark-brown hair, cut a bit unevenly, fell over his collar in the back. It was straight and showed a few threads of gray, although the man didn't seem much older than his early- to mid-thirties.

She walked to the radio and turned down the volume. Someone with less steady nerves might have been startled into dropping the screwdriver or making an exclamation of surprise, but this man did neither. He simply turned his head and stared at her.

She gazed into a pair of pale-silver eyes and wished he were still wearing his mirrored sunglasses. His eyes held no life. They were hard and dead. Even now, when she was most desperate, she didn't want to believe her eyes looked like that—so unfeeling, so empty of hope.

"What do you want?"

The sound of that flat, emotionless voice chilled her, but she forced her lips into a carefree smile. "Nice to meet you, too. I'm Rachel Stone. That five-year-old you terrorized is my son Edward, and the rabbit he carries around is named Horse. Don't ask."

If she'd hoped to draw a smile from him, she failed miserably. It was hard to imagine that mouth ever smiling. "I thought I told you to stay off my property."

Everything about him irritated her, a fact she did her best to conceal behind an innocent expression. "Did you? I guess I forgot."

"Look, lady—"

"Rachel. Or Ms. Stone, if you want to be formal. As it happens, this is your lucky day. Fortunately for you, I have a forgiving nature, and I'm prepared to overlook your giant case of male PMS. Where do I start?"

"What are you talking about?"

"That sign I saw on the marquee. I'm your help wanted. Personally, I think we should get that playground cleaned up right away. Do you know what kind of lawsuits you're setting yourself up for with all that broken-down equipment?"

"I'm not hiring you."

"Of course you are."

"Now why's that?" he asked with no particular interest.

"Because you're obviously an intelligent man, despite your surly manner, and anyone with intelligence can see that I'm a terrific worker."

"What I see is that I need a man."

She smiled sweetly. "Don't we all."

He wasn't amused, but neither did he seem annoyed by her flippancy. There was simply nothing there. "I'm only going to hire a man."

"I'll just pretend I didn't hear that, since sexual discrimination is illegal in this country."

"So sue me."

Another woman might have given up, but Rachel had less than ten dollars in her wallet, a hungry child, and a car that wouldn't run.

"You're making a big mistake. An opportunity like me doesn't come along every day."

"I don't know how to say it any plainer, lady. I'm not going to hire you." He set the screwdriver on the counter, then reached into his rear pocket and pulled out a wallet that had molded to the shape of his hip. "Here's twenty bucks. Take it and get out."

She needed the twenty dollars, but she needed a job more, and she shook her head. "Keep your charity, Mr. Rockefeller. I want steady work."

"Look for it someplace else. What I have is hard manual labor. The lot has to be cleared, the building needs paint, the roof repaired. It'll take a man to do that kind of work."

"I'm stronger than I look, and I'll work harder than any man you'll ever find. Besides, I can also provide psychiatric counseling for that troublesome personality disorder of yours."

The moment the words were out, she could have bitten her tongue because his expression seemed to grow even emptier.

His lips barely moved, and she thought of a flat-eyed gunslinger with a mile-deep grudge against life. "Anybody ever tell you that you've got a smart mouth?"

"It goes with my brain."

"Mommy?"

The drive-in's owner stiffened. She turned to see Edward standing in the doorway, Horse dangling from his hand and lines of worry etched in his face. He kept his eyes on the man while he spoke. "Mommy, I got to ask you something."

She moved to his side. "What's wrong?"

He lowered his voice into a child's whisper, which she knew the man could hear clearly. "Are you sure we're not gonna die?"

Her heart twisted "I'm sure."

The foolishness of coming here on this wild-goose chase once again hit her. How would she support them until she found what she was looking for? No one who knew who she was would give her a job, which meant her only chance lay in finding someone who'd moved here recently. That brought her full circle to the owner of the Pride of Carolina Drive-in.

He stalked to the old black wall phone. As she turned to see what he was going to do, she spotted a tattered purple flyer hanging nearby. Its curled edges didn't conceal the handsome face of G. Dwayne Snopes, the dead televangelist.

Join the Faithful at the Temple of Salvation

as We Broadcast God's Message to the World!

"Dealy, it's Gabe Bonner. A woman's car broke down out here, and she needs a tow."

Two things hit her at once—the fact that she didn't want a tow and the man's name. Gabriel Bonner. What was a member of Salvation's most prominent family doing running a drive-in?

As she remembered, there were three Bonner brothers, but only the youngest, the Reverend Ethan Bonner, had lived in Salvation when she'd been here. Cal, the oldest brother, had been a professional football player. Although she understood he'd visited frequently, she'd never met him, but she knew what he looked like from photographs. Their father, Dr. Jim Bonner, was the county's most respected physician, and their mother, Lynn, its social leader. Her fingers tightened on Edward's shoulders as she reminded herself that she had come to the land of her enemies.

"… then send the bill to me. And Dealy, take the woman and her son over to Ethan's. Tell him to find them a place to stay for the night."

After a few more terse words, he hung up and returned his attention to Rachel. "Wait by your car. Dealy'll send somebody out as soon as his truck gets back."

He walked over to stand by the door, one hand on the handle, his responsibility clearly discharged. She hated everything about him: his aloofness, his indifference, and she especially hated the strong male body that gave him a survival advantage she didn't possess. She hadn't asked for charity. All she wanted was a job. And his presumption in ordering her car towed threatened more than her transportation. The Impala was their home.

She snatched up the sandwich and bag of potato chips he'd left on the counter and grabbed Edward's hand. "Thanks for lunch, Bonner." She swept past him without giving him another glance.

Edward trotted at her side all the way down the rutted gravel lane. She held his hand crossing the highway. As they once again sat down under the buckeye tree, she fought against her despair. She wasn't going to give up yet.

They'd barely gotten settled before a dusty black pickup with Gabriel Bonner at the wheel shot out of the drive-in's entrance, turned onto the highway, and disappeared. She unwrapped the sandwich and investigated its contents for Edward: turkey breast, Swiss cheese, and mustard. He didn't like mustard, and she wiped off as much as she could before she handed it to him. He began to eat with only the slightest hesitation. He was too hungry to be fussy.

The tow truck arrived before he finished, and a short, stocky teenager got out. She left Edward under the tree and crossed the road to greet him with a cheery wave.

"As it turns out, I don't need a tow. Just give me a push, will you? Gabe wants me to put the car behind those trees over there."

She pointed to a grove not far from where Edward was sitting. The teenager was clearly dubious, but he also wasn't very bright, and it didn't take her long to convince him to help her. By the time he left, her Impala was hidden.

For now, it was the best she could do. They needed the Impala to sleep in, and they couldn't do that if it had been towed to a junkyard. The fact that the car couldn't be driven made it even more imperative that she convince Gabe Bonner to give her a job. But how? It occurred to her that someone so devoid of emotion might better be convinced with results.

She returned to Edward and pulled him to his feet. "Bring along that bag of chips, partner. We're going back to the drive-in. It's time for me to get to work."

"Did you get a job?"

"Let's just say I'm going to audition." She led him to the highway.

"What's that mean?"

"It's sort of like showing off what I can do. And while I work, you can finish your lunch on that playground, you lucky dog."

"You eat with me."

"I'm not hungry right now." It was almost true. It had been so long since she'd eaten a full meal that she'd passed the point of feeling hunger.

While she settled Edward by the concrete turtle, she studied her surroundings and tried to see what chore wouldn't require any special tools but would still make an impression. Clearing the lot of some of its weeds seemed like the best option. She decided to start in the middle, where her efforts would be most conspicuous.

As she began to work, the sun beat down on her, and the skirt of her blue chambray dress snagged her legs, while dirt sifted through the straps of her battered sandals and turned her feet brown. Her toe began to bleed beneath the makeshift patch.

She wished she were wearing her jeans. She only had one pair left, and they were old and frayed with a gaping hole in the knee and a smaller one in the threadbare seat.

The bodice of her dress was soon soaked with sweat.

Her damp hair lay in wet ribbons against her cheeks and neck. She pricked her finger on the spine of a thistle, but her hands were too grubby to suck the wound.

When she had a large pile, she threw everything into an empty garbage can, then dragged it to the dumpster behind the snack bar. She returned to her weeding with grim determination. The Pride of Carolina represented her last chance, and she had to show Bonner that she could work harder than a dozen men.

As the afternoon grew hotter, she became increasingly light-headed, but she didn't let dizziness slow her down. She hauled another load to the dumpster, then bent back to her task. Silvery dots swirled before her eyes as she pulled up ragweed and goldenrod. Her hands and arms bled from deep scratches made by blackberry brambles. Rivulets of sweat ran between her breasts.

She realized that Edward had begun pulling up weeds at her side, and once again, she cursed herself for not giving in to Clyde Rorsch. Her head felt as if it were on fire, and the silver dots raced faster. She needed to sit down and rest, but there was no time.

The silvery dots turned into an explosion of fireworks, and the ground began to shift beneath her. She tried to keep her balance, but it was too much. Her head spun, and her knees gave way. The fireworks passed into inky blackness.

Ten minutes later when Gabe Bonner returned to the drive-in, he found the boy huddled on the ground, guarding the motionless body of his mother.